The Best Pavilions at Expo 2015

The World Exhibition – sounds quiet glamorous, doesn’t it? And the topic “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life” seems interesting?

Well then what is keeping you from coming? With Expo closing at the end of the month, it is time to visit a few pavilions, before they all get destroyed (well, the Palazzo Italiano will remain). I have been able to visit most of them on the four days that I visited the Expo site and would like to introduce you to my favourites:

The Nature-Focused

Brazil

What makes this pavilion so special is the net that spans above a beautifully arranged garden full of tropical plants. You can walk along it and be reminded of a treetop walk in the Amazonian Rain Forest (which was accordingly added to my Bucket List!).

My mum and me enjoyed the fresh air in Austria’s pavilion

Austria

The Austrian pavilion also highlights the beauty of nature. The moment you step into this peaceful pavilion you can feel the difference: cleaner air and a cooler atmosphere. A welcome escape from the rest of Expo! This is a wake-up call and remind us how important trees and plants in general are.

The Thought-Provoking

Switzerland

The first thing that makes this pavilion awesome: you reserve your entrance time beforehand which means: no queues!
Then there’s the simple, but clever idea. At the beginning of Expo in May the towers were filled with coffee, dried apple rings, salt and water. You are allowed to take what you want which shows how humans overindulge – I mean just look at the reduction of resources in this picture:

Usage of finite resources

Germany

After the devastating impression you got from the Swiss pavilion you might like to learn what you can do for a more sustainable future. So, if you want some hands-on information (and to be completely overwhelmed by the amount of it!) go queue for the German Expo pavilion! Here, you can learn how to grow your own food or throw away less. Don’t worry, you can take the info sheets with you so you don’t have to remember everything.
In the end there’s a typical German show (singing, clapping and even some moo-ing) which might seem silly, but for me it was loads of fun.

The Entertaining

Qatar and UAE

If you want to get entertained – go to one of these pavilions. While they are different, I’m grouping them together because they have great multimedia shows (the best is probably the one by the UAE, but you might not want to queue that long). It is also really

interesting to see how much money they were willing to spend for a pavilion that will be destroyed when Expo closes.

Uruguay

This pavilion shows just another show – less intimidating than the ones I just talked about. It might not have been a highlight for most – but the emotional impact the movie had on me made it stay in my mind (which is more than you can say for a lot of the other pavilions!)

The Beautiful

Morocco and South Korea

These pavilions are the most beautiful – and they talk about the subject of Expo, good nutrition, and what their own country does to be sustainable. Morocco is presenting more information while South Korea’s strength lies in the artistic way of presentation. Both create a unique atmosphere that is worth the visit.

The Honest

Slow Food Pavilion

Without the propaganda that surrounds each of the other pavilions the subject gets a deeper meaning here. Even if you already know everything they present, the recap is great! For those who haven’t already thought about sustainable usage of food get to learn about the problems and their solutions!

Only beautiful from outside: Vietnam

I haven’t visited all pavilions. I missed out on Japan, Kazakhstan (which are said to be highlights as well), Israel, Chile, Mexico, Spain, China and Nepal. So, there could be some gems there, too. However, don’t queue for the Vietnamese one – it is basically one big show room of overpriced and tacky tourist-stuff. It’s also quiet claustrophobic to walk the whole way in a queue without a chance to get out… If you want to know what to eat, I did enjoy this article.

So, what about you? Did you go to Expo? Which pavilions were your favourite?